[cnity]

> I can draw things I imagine, even though I can't see them.

This is what I mean though. What do you mean by "see" exactly, if not imagine? You can imagine something so clearly that you are able to replicate it on paper, yet that is not the minds eye? I also see while dreaming, in a way that is more like my day to day experience, and not at all how I would describe imagining things.

> I saw images as clearly as if I was looking at a photograph while awake

If anything this is more mind's eye clarity than I have ever experienced. My mind's eye is nothing like looking at an actual photograph.

[tekla]

It's super interesting to read these accounts. I have my doubts that Aphatasia is real for 99% of people who claim to have it and its a language issue.

What is imagination if not seeing the thing in your head. Do people think others LITERALLY see an object like photons are hitting their neurons directly?

[vidarh]

Some people do report seeing things as clear as if photos are hitting their eyes. Most people report more diffuse views.

I see nothing, but I have seen once, and when I did, I did "literally" see an object as clear as if I was looking straight at it, or to be more precisely a I saw a whole scene.

[khazhoux]

I don’t think anyone thinks it should be like photons. I think we all understand that internal visualization is something different.

[vidarh]

This is hard to talk about because all of our terms for it involve assumptions of seeing.

But when I "imagine" something, there is unambiguously no visual whatsoever. I can't see lines, colors, points. Nothing, any more than if there was a wall between me and an object I have never seen.

But that doesn't mean I don't have knowledge of it.

> I also see while dreaming, in a way that is more like my day to day experience, and not at all how I would describe imagining things.

Then how would you describe imagining things? Because if you don't see something when imagining it while awake, then that sounds like aphantasia.

> If anything this is more mind's eye clarity than I have ever experienced. My mind's eye is nothing like looking at an actual photograph.

And yet what I experienced isn't even near the high end of reported experiences of people.

[cnity]

Maybe let's loop in other senses for a second. Since, presumably aphantasia doesn't apply to all senses? I can imagine the sensation of my tongue on a cold ice cream, and even the taste. But I don't _taste and feel_ it. I can imagine burning my hand on a hot stove, but I don't recoil. See how they are separate but related? The same is true for how I imagine things visually. I don't actually see them, but I imagine them. I don't know how else to articulate that seeing and visualising are not the same thing.